An education in Interior Design is a mix of excitement, countless changes, sweat, and tears during college studio courses and real life experience. In school, we learn the technicalities of design: standard sizes of furniture, clearances around furniture, codes for various building types and occupancies, rendering the colorful details of your design, and computer generations- just to name a few! Days, late nights, weeks, and/or months are spent coordinating everything you have learned in previous and current studio courses, into a semester-long project. There usually isn’t a budget to work within or an actual client with their particular taste and style. Even though it’s hard work and we learn from our design mistakes, the studio experience can’t begin to measure up to the knowledge we’re expected to know in the real world.

The real world brings more to the table, real projects and real experience. Budgets exist with every project and short time constraints could be a possibility. We actually have to make the time schedules and contracts that we learned about in our design business courses. We have to learn about furniture, fabric, lighting and accessory lines. Most importantly, you have to be able to sell your design, merchandise, and yourself to your clients. The only way to learn about all extents of the design world is experience, and experience requires time. We can’t “know it all” in a year, or two years, or even three for that matter. Experience is gained by learning from each and every project and client; walking away from the project with more wisdom and knowledge than before. Learning from designers who already have experience and time under their belt, could prove to be influential as well! So here’s to the real world experiences and taking each project one day at a time while giving them all we have!

It’s long been determined from a design sense, that white has 2 distinct directions of style. Beach cottages along seaside towns have drawn inspiration from the “shabby chic” look of natural oyster linens and white seashells. From a completely different angle, white can also represent a clean and sterile contemporary environment found in urban lofts and big city high rises.

White is timeless, and can be used in ANY color scheme. To avoid changing the entire look and feel of your home, add white pieces here and there. Try a white coverlet, linen window treatment panels, or a cool sleek white Barcelona chair. Paint walls a classic white such as Benjamin Moore’s White Dove or Decorator’s White.

Most importantly, don’t be scared to take the plunge and go all white!

What’s the best way to have enough storage and seating without making a smaller space feel cramped and full of heavy furniture? Keep it light. Using transparent furniture and accessories gives you that functional aspect without visually weighing down your space.

The original Philippe Starck Victoria Ghost chair started the trend for this mixture of the contemporary feel with the traditional lines. It’s perfectly acceptable to mix a ghost chair with a driftwood dining table, or have a glass cocktail table atop an antique wool rug. The unexpected mixture of different styles and textures is what sets a room apart.
What’s the difference between the substances?

Lucite is defined as a synthetic polymer of methyl methacrylate. Colourless and highly transparent, the solid material has high dimensional stability and good resistance to weathering and shock.

Acrylic is a material derived from acrylic acid.

Glass is simply a hard, brittle, noncrystalline, more or less transparent substance produced by fusion, usually consisting of mutually dissolved silica.

Now that the technicalities are out of the way, how can you use those materials as furniture pieces in your home? Scroll through the images below, and prepare to be inspired.

We love our favorite artists so much it was impossible to cover it all in one entry. Justin Gaffrey is another one of our favorite local arts that we have to mention. The dimension and texture in his media is unparalleled. His work is described as classically impressionistic with breathtaking beauty and complexity. His pallet is usually vibrant colors but he also works with softer colors as well. In many of his pieces, he finds his inspiration from the beauty along Highway 30-A, which our clients love. Gaffrey’s art works well with all design concepts and is perfect if you have a neutral pallet and are looking for just the right pop of color to make a statement. Here are a few pieces of his art we have come to love.

A new artist who has just brought her funky style to the Emerald Coast is Sarah Ashley Longshore. She is well known in New Orleans, as well as, throughout the country. This year’s VIE cover artist and headlining artist of Alys Beach’s Digital Grafitti, a Lovelace Interiors sponsored event, where she showcased some of her amazing art. One of our favorite pieces was titled ‘Box of Birds’. This would be a great piece to add flavor in a spacious dressing room.

Here are a few of Longshore’s other pieces she showcased at Digital Graffiti.